The friend I am staying with in Amman will go over to the West Bank with me next week. She also stayed there three months last spring and worked with the same organization. It has been deeply nourishing to catch up with someone who shares my ethics and knows what it is like to be in occupied Palestine.
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Last night, she mentioned that hope is a burden. I was surprised to hear her say this because I think of hope as a thing that uplifts me and lightens my spirit. She went on to explain that apathy seems easier for people because it gives them an excuse not to fight for a more just world. People who let themselves fall into despair avoid feeling compelled to enact change. They can be complacent. Hope, on the other hand, demands action. It requires participating.
Until a person understands what is worth fighting for, hope can feel uncomfortable. To me, the trade-off of shallow happiness is not worth sacrificing my humanity. To others, this is the choice they unintentionally make.
She reminded me that not everyone can do direct action like we do. It is a product of white supremacy and hero complex to imagine we can do it all. Some people are more adept to do the slow but necessary work of education, for example. We all have changing seasons in our life when we are more able and inclined to do certain things. Right now I do not have much patience for trying to convince people why they should care and why they should do more. I no longer have energy for those who have only just begun to educate themselves. I often feel guilty about this.
It is hard to tease apart saviorism from feeling responsible to do all I can as a person with privilege and wanting to rise up to that role. I know that I can reach audiences that others — Palestinians and other oppressed people — cannot. But my friend reminded me that not everyone can do the work we do nor would everyone be a good fit even if they wanted to. She said that we only have so much energy so we should go where we are most effective. We must be intentional about how we spend our time to make this work sustainable. When a genocide is happening we have to prioritize who and what we give attention to if we want to be effective in stopping it.
My friend told me it’s ok that I’m not doing everything because I am doing work that not everyone can. We have been through stuff that fundamentally changed us as people and have seen things we can’t unsee. We can never go back to the people we were, nor should we.
In this moment in time I only have patience for those already working to make this world better. We all have our roles though, so maybe it’s OK to let the liberals convince other liberals that they should have basic empathy. Maybe it’s OK if I rely on others to convince people to get involved.
I still wish I could do it all. I still want to do more. But maybe it’s ok to trust I am doing what I can in each moment. Right now, in Amman, that looks like resting before I go over to the West Bank.